I ought to know; for our want of it through one wicked extravagance or another"—with a dreadful glance at the earl-"has been the worry and bane of my married life."

"It is not pleasant, I should imagine, to entertain a profound contempt for the man you marry," argued Lady Adela, the most profound contempt in her own tone as she said it, "and with no other sentiment could I ever regard him."

"Oh, my dear, that's nothing," answered the countess. "Many who marry in veneration find it subside into contempt incredibly soon afterwards. I can tell you that"-with another killing glance at the peer. "Enough of argument," he growled. What answer may I give,

Adela?"

"To the grub, papa ?" She was getting flippant again. "To Mr. Grubb. For shame, Adela.”

Ι

"Tell him he was formerly an object of indifference to me, but that now I hate him as much as I hate his name."

She escaped from the room as she spoke, leaving the countess at the commencement of a furious speech, and the earl looking daggers, and drumming on the arm of his chair. In her own chamber she found her sister Grace.

66

They have been at me on all sides to make me have that man," she dutifully exclaimed. "I wish they may wring a consent out of me!" "Why not have him, Adela? The advantages are great. Why not ?"

"Don't you press the question. You are not in the deuce's own mess for money, if they are.'

"But tell me the reason, dear Adela."

"One is, that I"-she hesitated, and turned her back to her sister"will not marry. Him or any one else. There's time enough." A light-or rather a doubt-seemed to break upon Lady Grace. "Adela," she whispered, "it is not possible you are still thinking of Captain Stanley?"

"Where would be the use of that ?" was the evasive answer. "He is fighting in India and I am here: little chance of our paths in life ever again crossing each other."

"If I really thought your head was still running upon Captain Stanley, with hope, I would tell you

"What?" for Lady Grace had stopped.

"The truth," was the reply, in a low voice. "News of him has arrived in England."

"News! What?-when ?"

"Oh, this fortnight ago. Mamma warned us to keep it from you." "Oh, Grace! Grace!" she exclaimed, with a startling amount of despair in her tone, "he is dead!"

"Not dead, child."

"Wounded! wounded unto death! Dead, perhaps, by this time!" "Do not excite yourself like this, Adela. Mamma was right, it seems. Captain Stanley was alive and well."

Tell me what it is you have to say," Adela rejoined, impatiently, "for I will know it."

"Are you sure you can bear it? Seeing what I now see, news of his death might, to you, be more tolerable."

"Bear it? nonsense!" was the impatient answer.

"He is married."

Come, Gracie." "Another tale," retorted Lady Adela, after a pause; but her lips quivered, and her face had turned as white as ashes.

"It is truth, Adela, on my word of honour. He has married his cousin, a Miss Stanley, and it is said there was some early attachment between them. She was over here for her education, and was sent back to India to be away from him."

No words, no answer for several minutes, and then a hollow laugh broke from Lady Adela. "The grub, now," she muttered-" any one."

III.

DAINTILY she swept into the room at the hour appointed for her first interview with Mr. Grubb, now a successful suitor, the earl having signified to him his daughter's gracious acceptance of his hand. He stood in agitation at its upper end, a fine intellectual man, one to be venerated and loved. She was in a pink-and-white silk dress, and her hair had, pink and white roses in it for the dinner hour was approaching, and she was already attired for it. A rich colour was in her cheeks, her beautiful eyes and features were lighted up with it, and her tall, delicate figure was thrown back-in disdain. Oh that he could have read it then!

He never afterwards quite remembered what he said when he first approached her. He knew he took her hand. And he believed he whispered words of thanks.

"They are not due to me," was her answer, delivered with cold equanimity. "My father tells me I must marry, and I accede to it."

66

May God enable me to reward you for the confidence you repose in me!" he whispered. "If it be given to love a wife, as one never yet was loved, may it be given to me!"

She twisted her hand from him with an ungracious movement, for he would have retained it, and walked deliberately across the room, leaving him where he stood, and rang the bell.

"Tell mamma Mr. Grubb is here," she said to the man who answered it.

:

He felt pained he understood this had been an accorded interview. But the countess did not come immediately.

"Our opportunities for meeting have been but few, Lady Adela," he said, again drawing near to her, but in those few I have learnt to idolise you. Regard not the expression as the random assertion of a lover," he hastened to add, "no other word would denote the feelings of my heart: you are indeed its idol, cherished, worshipped. May I hope that I am not wholly indifferent to you."

"There should be no misunderstanding between us on this point," she hastily answered; and could it be that there was contempt in her tone? "I have agreed to be your wife, but, thirty hours ago, the possibility of my becoming so had never been suggested to my mind. Therefore the love that I suppose ought to accompany this sort of contract is not mine to offer."

How wondrously calm she spoke-in so matter-of-fact, business-like a sort of way! It struck even him, infatuated as he was. "Oh, Lady Adela, it may come in time," he whispered. "My love shall call forth yours; my

"I hear mamma," interrupted Lady Adela, as if anxious to drown what he was saying. And in truth Lady Oakton did then enter the

room.

"Adela, where's your town house to be ?" began one of the girls that evening. "Not in the smoky City, surely?"

"Ada, mind which box you secure at the Opera. Let there be room for us all," added Lady Frances.

"Of course you'll be accabléed with diamonds," suggested Lady Mary. "Don't trust the setting to his plebeian taste; see into it for yourself." "There's one good will come out of this wedding, if nothing else does: mamma must give us new things, and plenty of them."

I say, Ada, could you not persuade your Plutus to drop a purse of his gold amongst us in the shape of ornaments? There's nobody kept so short of them as we are. It's a shame!"

"Not he," remarked Lady Grace. "He is ready to lavish all he's worth upon Adela, but for us he has neither eyes nor generosity." Generosity-stop there. He is generous to a fault. Is he not,

Adela ?"

"How you tease!" was Lady Adela's languid rejoinder. ask him."

"Go and "I protest, Adela, if you show yourself so supremely indifferent, he will declare off before the wedding-day."

"And take up with one of you? I wish he would."

"No fear. Ada's chains are round him fast."

"Chains!" echoed Lady Adela. "It is quite absurd to be loved as he loves me and so vulgar! It is the way with those plebeians." "I wonder what sort of a trousseau our lady-mother will afford you, Ada ?"

"Everything desirable, you'll see," cried Harriet. purse-strings for this."

"I dare say," was the observation of Lady Grace. can make the bridegroom pay for it."

"Which they are sure to do in the long run."

"She'll stretch her

"Especially if they

And the young ladies laughed. Verily, to them, enshrined in their selfish exclusiveness, the money of the trading merchant was of no account, save to assist such wants as theirs.

The preparations for the wedding were begun. On so magnificent a scale that the fashionable world of London was ringing with them. The bridegroom's liberality, in all that concerned his future wife, could not be surpassed. Settlements, houses, carriages, horses, furniture, ornaments, jewellery, all were perfect of their kind, leaving nothing to be wished for. The Lady Adela had once spoken of Aladdin's lamp, in reference to her sister Grace's ideal union : one, looking on these real preparations, might have imagined that some magic, equally powerful, had been at work now.

The marriage was to take place in February, at Netherleigh, where the family had gone in October. Mr. Grubb went down to spend Christmas with them. They were all cordial with him, save Adela; she continued to express the most haughty indifference. The girls really began to like him very much, and their ridicule insensibly gave way to praises. There were even times when they forgot he was not of their

own order. As to Lady Adela, Mr. Grubb had never been engaged to a young lady before, and he probably thought-or tried to think-that her avoidance of him and coldness, her scarcely-concealed contempt, were all proper, and in keeping with good manners. Loving as he did, so blindly, he would not see a fault in her.

But let no woman go to the altar, cherishing a hatred or contempt of him who is to be her husband. Better break off the marriage, no matter at what exposure or cost, before it is indissolubly formed, for such a one will surely lead to evil. Many unions are entered into in indifference, and they, in time, may become unions of affection. Not of impassioned love; but, so much the better, for while the one won't last, the other will but when a woman deliberately nourishes in her heart an aversion against a man, let her consent to call any in the world husband, rather than him.

February came, and, with its first week, the day appointed for the ceremony. A bishop, in the clearest and finest of lawn sleeves, was the officiating minister, and a resplendent group stood around him. The bridegroom, calm, self-possessed, of commanding presence; the bride with a flush of emotion on her face, and somewhat hysterical, her white robes rich with splendour, and her costly veil floating around her. Seldom had a bride of more exquisite beauty knelt before that Right Reverend Father in God, the Bishop of L

Afterwards came the breakfast, all in the customary orthodox fashion. The bishop made a speech, a compound of secular congratulations and clerical blessings; the bridegroom made a speech, sensible and to the purpose, like himself; and the Earl of Oakton made one. It was four o'clock in the afternoon before the carriage drew up that was to take them away.

A chaste, elegant equipage, worth their crowding round the windows to look at, and four superb horses. In this, at any rate, the merchant had displayed a taste worthy of a patrician. When the Lady Adela, in her travelling attire, came out, her father and bridegroom were both awaiting her. The latter stepped forward to hand her to the carriage, but with a gesture of aversion, very plain to the surrounding servants, she turned to the earl, and he led her down the steps, and placed her in. He followed her, shaking hands with the earl, and in one moment the stately equipage was gone.

He stole his arm around her. "Oh, Adela, my dearest!" he whispered, his voice tremulous with the emotion of his true heart, "how I have longed and prayed for this day! it seemed to me that it would never come; that bliss so unspeakable never could be mine. My own wife! How shall I convince you of my deep affection?"

66

Pray do not

He had taken her hand in his, and he bent his face towards hers, and would have kissed it. No very inexcusable presumption in a bridegroom: but she hastily drew away her face and her hand, and moved as closely as possible to her own corner of the chariot, and turned her head from him, and gazed pertinaciously out at the road-side trees. attempt these-endearments," she said, in a scornful tone, agreeable." And Mr. Grubb leaned back in the carriage, away from her, and a bitter blight stole over his spirit. It may be, we shall meet them again in life. It's not certain, mind. Nothing is, but death and quarter-day.

they are not where he sat,

SEYMOUR'S RUSSIA ON THE BLACK SEA AND SEA OF AZOF.*

THE events of the last eighteen months have naturally excited public curiosity upon every subject connected with the vast empire of Russia, and the press has certainly done its utmost to satisfy this popular feeling. We have books upon the history, topography, government, and resources of that overgrown country; we have travels throughout her European and Asiatic provinces; we have statistics of her population, of her naval and military forces, of her revenue and commerce, sufficient to fill a parliamentary blue-book; and the cry is "still they come," for no weekly list of new works seems complete unless it contains some addition to this Russian library, which appears likely to rival in bulk the collection of pamphlets upon the corn laws, or upon the celebrated Scottish question of non-intrusion.

But although some of the books thus presented to the public are mere compilations, hurriedly got up to meet a sudden demand, there are others which have been written by men who have travelled and resided in the countries about which they write, who have studied their history, and acquired an intimate knowledge of the usages and manners of their inhabitants. Among the best of these valuable works is that recently published by Mr. Seymour upon "Russia on the Black Sea and the Sea of Azof." The author has repeatedly visited these countries, and besides having availed himself of the best books in our own language, has studied attentively the elaborate works of those French and German authors who have written upon the history and resources of Russia; and he has made the best use of the mass of information thus acquired, for it is admirably arranged, condensed within the compass of a single volume, and conveyed to the reader in a fluent and agreeable style.

Mr. Seymour's book may be divided into two great sections, one upon the history, physical geography and commercial resources of Southern Russia and the Crimea, and the other upon the formation, numerical strength, and annual expense of the Russian army and navy. These topics are treated in a most exhaustive manner, nothing is left untouched, and the knowledge thus imparted is communicated in a lively and pleasant manner, in spite of the statistical details which the nature of the subject frequently demands.

We shall now endeavour briefly to afford our readers some idea of the way in which Mr. Seymour treats the various matters comprehended under the above divisions.

The Crimea is valuable to Russia not so much for its population, extent, or fertility, as from its peculiar and commanding position. It supplies the lever which will enable her to move the empire of the East within her grasp. It dominates the Black Sea, and furnishes the key to Constantinople. In extent (10,050 square miles) it is nearly equal to Sicily, but its population is only 200,000, whilst that of Sicily, in spite of mis

Russia on the Black Sea and Sea of Azof, being a Narrative of Travels in the Crimea and bordering Provinces; with Notices of the Naval, Military, and Commercial Resources of these Countries. By H. D. Seymour, M.P. London: John Murray, Albemarle-street. 1855.